1613

A controversial purchase

On March 10th, Shakespeare buys a controversial home. Adjacent to the Blackfriars, the gatehouse is a home that features a warren of tunnels, and which is well known to Elizabeth's goon squads as a Catholic safe house.

Years later, the structural collapse of an adjacent building will kill a Catholic priest and ninety of a 300-strong congregation in the house. If the gatehouse was used as a refuge before and after Shakespeare's ownership, it seems without doubt that it must have been used for such purposes during his ownership and with his tacit approval. The figure to whom the house passed in Shakespeare's will, one John Robinson, remains a puzzling enigma.